Using Joomla

Section Manager Overview

The Section Manager (see Figure 5-2) is the top-level view of your site’s articles. If your site is small, you may only need a single section and you’ll organize your articles within its categories. But most sites will have a number of sections (e.g., About Us, Our Portfolio) to give more control and flexibility over how your articles are displayed. The Section Manager enables you to copy, edit, create, and delete sections. Before you can create content, you’ll need to first create a section.

Figure 5-2. The Section Manager

Creating Sections

You must create at least one section before you create categories or articles. For example, let’s say you are building a website about pets. You may want to start by creating a section for the types of pets (dog, cat, fish, etc.), knowing that your categories in each will be a type of animal (Labrador, bulldog, etc.). To create a new section:

1. Go to the Section Manager and click the New button in the top toolbar. This opens the Section Editor (see Figure 5-3).

2. Enter a title for the section.

3. Choose an access level—Public, Registered, or Special. Most often this will be set to Public. If set to Registered, registered users or higher will have access. Special means only Administrators will have access. For more information on access levels, see Permissions.

4. Optionally, you may also enter a description of the section ...